


Across the Universe

by jeleania



Category: Brave (2012), How to Train Your Dragon (2010), Rise of the Guardians (2012), Tangled (2010)
Genre: Gen, Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-19
Updated: 2013-12-19
Packaged: 2018-01-05 04:05:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1089417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeleania/pseuds/jeleania
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thirty universes where Hiccup, Rapunzel, Merida, and Jack got to know each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Across the Universe

**Author's Note:**

> so, found a list of thirty prompts, each one a different universe to put your chosen characters in. I plan on doing all thirty AUs ...eventually...
> 
> here's the first one.

 

**1\. Fantasy**

 

* * *

 

It had been a normal day when he'd first met him.

 

Hiccup had been soaring through the sky alongside his heart-brother Toothless, matching the lazy loops and turns of his night-dark companion easily. The wind swept along his scales and under his wings, embracing and accepting him as his father and clan never did. Here, with the black dragon at his wing tip, it didn't matter that he was small or deformed or overly curious about things beyond the clan. Toothless wasn't much bigger than him, never mentioned his lack of a limb, and loved to explore as much as he did. He was free to be himself.

 

Just him and Toothless and the wide wide sky.

 

The sudden chill of ice splashing on his belly was completely unexpected.

 

Hiccup yelped in surprise and twisted into a barrel roll, green eyes darting about trying to find the source.

 

"There!" Toothless growled, hovering a bit below his younger heart-brother protectively.

 

Following that poisonous green glare, the cream and brown-streaked green dragon found his attacker. "Is that ...?"

 

"An ice griffin." The black reptilian being huffed, eyeing the feathered beast warily. 

 

"What's it doing around here?" Hiccup wondered aloud. "I thought they liked the polar ice caps and high mountains."

 

"Don't know - Incoming."

 

The pair darted apart, avoiding the jet of ice shot at them. The lion-like creature cackled at them, frolicking and rolling in the air in its amusement.

 

Two sets of green eyes met, then smirks curved their lips, revealing sharp teeth. Then the two dragons folded their wings and dove.

 

White feathers nearly got singed by a blue plasma bolt courtesy of Toothless, an indignant squawk coming from the raptor like beak. Startling blue eyes measured them both where they were hovering nearby, then glinted with mischief. Clumps of snow conjured out of thin air pummeled the flying reptiles, earning glares and hisses. The griffin flicked his feline tail at them, ear tufts raised playfully, then large feathered wings carried the being away.

 

This set off a chaotic aerial game of chase. Plasma bolts and small balls of flame were evaded by the feathered being, the sudden snowballs and random shots of ice meeting their marks about half the time. Despite the chill on their scales, even Toothless quickly relaxed into the fun. After all, if the griffin was serious with that ice, they'd probably both be frozen solid by now.

 

Unfortunately, all fun has to end sometime.

 

Especially when silly boys weren't keeping an eye on the level of collateral damage...

 

The griffin swept along the treetops and twisted midair to face his pursuers. He started to gather the energy for another ice blast in one cat-like forepaw when one of the trees decided to reach out and smack him.

 

"Looks like he got too close." Toothless chuckled.

 

"No, look!" Hiccup cried in dismay. "The branches are attacking him!"

 

Sure enough, they both could see the topmost tree limbs reaching up and wrapping around the leopard-like body. The griffin shrieked in anger and fear, trying in vain to free himself with his claws and beak.

 

Dropping lower, Toothless quickly let loose a plasma bolt at some of the mess of vines and branches. It released one captured forelimb, letting the griffin continue his struggles. Before either dragon could do more, the trees below them suddenly burst with life and captured them as well. Both draconian beings were quickly muzzled as well as pinned. Then the trees pulled all three captives downward into the depths of the forest.

 

One twisting and confusing journey later, the flyers found themselves on the grass in a small clearing. Their attention was caught by an annoyed shout, startling them into silence and stillness.

 

"Oi, stay still, you drongos!"

 

The griffin stopped squirming and opened his beak. "Oh, come on, Cottontail! You know I don't like being tied up!"

 

The two dragons watched a tall mostly-human-shaped being with long rabbit ears step forward and tap the tip of a boomerang smartly against a feathery forehead. "No need to screech, Frostbite. I can hear ya just fine."

 

"Aster, come on, please?" He tried hard not to twitch too much, but the feeling of being trapped like this made his skin crawl, feathered ruff and fluffy tail puff in agitation. He hated it, being restrained this way bringing ugly painful memories to the forefront of his mind.

 

Seeing the growing panic and old terror in those blue eyes, the nature spirit known to friends as Bunny ran a human hand through his grayish-blue hair. "Alright, you promise not to run off?"

 

"Yes. I promise." Anything to be free...

 

One rabbit foot tapped a pattern on the earth, and the plant-life around the griffin retreated. The newly released being shuddered hard once, then crouched panting and shivering. 

 

"Easy, Jackie." Bunny crooned softly, knowing better than to try touching his winged friend while he was fighting off bad memories. Despite how kind hearted Frostbite was, he still had some nasty sharp claws and beak, and would lash out if he felt threatened right now. "Just breathe a bit. You're loose now. All's well."

 

Seeing the feathered and furred being start to take slow deep breaths, Bunny hopped closer to the dragons, letting them get a better look at him. The being was a good six-feet-tall minus the ears, thick fur with black markings on his shoulders and upper arms that were otherwise human. From the waist down were the hindquarters similar to a rabbit's if longer in limb, fluffy tail and all, making Hiccup think of the satyrs and fauns he and Toothless had flown over a few times. Eyes as bright green as grass sprouting in spring studied them just as closely. With a sigh, he said, "If I let you two go, will you not fly away or try to cook me?"

 

Hiccup looked to his heart-brother pleadingly. He knew Toothless was the more offended of the two of them. Getting a low grumble and grudging nod, the mostly green dragon quickly replied, "We'll be good."

 

"Sure ya will." came the doubtful drawl. But the vines and such slithered off their forms, lowering to stand the pair safely on their feet.

 

Calmer, the griffin called Jack regained some of his spunk. "Hey, why'd you grab us in the first place, Fluffy? What we do to you?"

 

Chuckling, Bunny put away his 'rang and leaned back on his haunches with arms idly crossed over his muscled chest. "Oh, I was just fulfilling a request. You'll have to talk to the ladies about that."

 

"The who?" Hiccup asked.

 

The reply came from behind the rabbit in the form of a roar and something big charging through the underbrush.

 

Toothless quickly placed himself between his little heart-brother and the oncoming threat, growling low with narrowed eyes. Hiccup crouched behind the other's dark mass, tail twitching nervously. Jack was in a similar position a few feet away, wings half-spread defensively.

 

Then a red-haired female centaur burst into the clearing, making them all pause and blink in surprise.

 

"You!" She pointed at the three, Bunny wisely moving off to the side to watch the show. "You three brats!"

 

Recognizing the young woman, Jack sat up and chuckled nervously. "Uh - H - Hi, Merida."

 

"Don't you Hi me, feather brain!" The female yelled, making white ear tufts pin to his head as the griffin cringed.

 

"Merida, shouting isn't helping." Another female voice spoke up.

 

The red-head in her dark green tunic trimmed in dark fur whirled around, a long tail as fiery and curly as the hair on her head whipping her chestnut flank. Sunlight glinted off the patterns embroidered on her clothing and the metal amulet on a cord around her neck. A quiver full of arrows and a longbow were strapped to her human back with a dagger at her belt.

 

"They damaged my forest!" She waved an indignant hand toward the north-west, the path the three flyers had taken. "Fire and plasma bolts don't mix with wood!"

 

Winces and chagrined looks were exchanged by the dragon pair.

 

The human-looking girl in a slim pale blue dress moved some of her long blond hair off her shoulder. "And some of Jack's wayward ice bolts froze half my lake and the river feeding it. But you don't need to be so loud. Just take a few breaths and calm down a bit."

 

With an aggravated yell, Merida throw up her hands and stalked away from the winged beings, muttering to herself as she stomped across the clearing.

 

Jack dared to speak up first in a meek voice. "Rapuzel? I'm really sorry I froze your area. I didn't mean to."

 

"And we're sorry too." Hiccup quickly threw in.

 

"Sorry won't fix my trees!" The fiery-tempered forest spirit shot back, arms akimbo and a forehoof stomping at the dirt with annoyance as she glared at them with narrowed blue eyes. "Sorry won't repair the homes of the creatures in my forest, or bring back the animals you roasted, or -!"

 

"Merida." The blond raised an eyebrow and peered at her from under her bangs.

 

Giving another huff, the centaur started to pace back and forth, grumbling to herself and throwing the dragons dirty looks.

 

Rapunzel shook her head and turned back to the three trouble-makers. "We _both understand_  that you boys didn't  _intentionally_ burn or ice the landscape, right Merida?" Getting a mutter that sounded grudgingly affirmative, she continued, "But since you boys weren't paying attention to your surroundings, damage was done. While apologies are nice, they won't fix things. So you boys will help clean up the messes you made -"

 

"WHAT!?" Merida cried, cantering over and skidding to a halt next to the blond. "I didn't agree to that!"

 

"Well, you want the forest cleaned up, right?" The girl looked up at the outraged centaur.

 

"Yes, but - " was the sputtered answer.

 

"And these two dragons named?" An inquisitive look was slanted their way.

 

"Hiccup. I'm Hiccup." A nod to the black dragon. "This is Toothless."

 

"Hiccup and Toothless?" The redhead peered at them in askance. "What kinda names are those?"

 

"Ours." Toothless growled, stepping protectively closer to his heart-brother. "What of it?"

 

Noticing the embarrassed slump of the green dragon with only one hind leg and the snarl on the black dragon's face, Rapuzel jumped in, "Unique names are good, aren't they, Merida?"

 

Shifting her weight on her hooves as she realized she'd hit a sore spot - and the smaller mottled dragon just looked to damn pitiful, Merida looked away with her arms crossed. "Yeah, they're good names."

 

A brush of feathers against his wing made Hiccup look up from his study of the grass beneath his claws. Turning his head, he found a pale face with bright blue eyes gazing at him. "Being different is good. Makes us special. As long as we have people who care about us, we'll be fine."

 

Glancing at the black wing half-covering him, then back at the griffin, Hiccup smiled. "Yeah." Then he had a thought he had to blurt out. "What are you doing this far south anyways?"

 

Jack sat on his feline haunches and shrugged feather covered shoulders, his single raptor clawed limb absently picking at the grass while the other leonine forepaw kneaded the earth. "I like to travel, see new places, meet people, that kind of thing. The cold is great and all, but it gets a bit lonely..."

 

Remembering that griffins normally had a bird of prey's forelimbs while Jack obviously didn't, it wasn't hard for Hiccup and Toothless to understand what wasn't being said. Even your own family, much less your kind, could push you to the outskirts of society if you were different. They both knew that feeling.

 

Perking up, Jack gave them his version of a grin with ear tufts straight up in happiness. "Besides, I've met Merida and Rapuzel and the Kangaroo over there -"

 

"I'm a bunny, damnit!" Aforementioned being called out in a mix of annoyance and fond exasperation.

 

" - and lots of other friends." The griffin continued, ignoring Bunny's usual remark of protest. "Plus, the people down here are more willing to have a bit of fun."

 

"Preferably without harming one's surroundings..." Merida cut in.

 

"And who brought down half the castle that time, hmm?" Rapuzel slyly asked.

 

A red blush covered the centaur's cheeks. "Those were ruins, they were already falling apart!"

 

"I must have visited them for years." Jack slipped in with a conspiring glance shared with the blond. "They were pretty solid then..."

 

"It was one time!" Burying her burning face in her hands, Merida whined, "You two are never going to let me live that down, are you?"

 

"Nope." Jack chirped, leopard's tail flicking against his flank idly.

 

"Not to mention," Rapuzel said in a more serious tone. "Your antics didn't just bring down part of the roof, the rubble broke one of Jack's wings. He was grounded and in pain for weeks. In the summer. He's a being of ice and snow. He's not meant to be in that kind of heat."

 

Wilting, Merida dropped her hands and studied at her shuffling hooves. "I know. And I was and still am sorry for that." She gave an apologetic look to the griffin, who shrugged and nodded, not having hard feelings about the matter or holding a grudge.

 

"And you were planning on setting a fire in that area soon, weren't you?" The blond pressed on. "Weed out the weaker trees, clear the underbrush, that sort of thing. In a way, the boys took care of that for you."

 

"I suppose..." Merida played with her hair, refusing to look at the dragons.

 

"Since it did go a bit out of control and the creatures living there weren't prepared, it still was a mistake of theirs. So, they, as beings of fire, can help you clean up the burnt trees and such." Rapuzel firmly ordered.

 

"Sure, we can do that." Hiccup said, wanting to keep the peace. Toothless nodded as well, deciding it made sense.

 

"And as for Jack and my lake," the blond turned her attention to the ice griffin with a smile. "I'm a powerful enough water nymph that a bit of ice won't hurt me or mine. But I expect you to defrost it all, and I know you can. Then you can help the boys and Merida by using your ice to put out any hot spots they find. We don't need the fire starting back up later, after all."

 

The griffin from the far north nodded agreeably. He knew it was fair, despite his discomfort around fire as a being of ice and cold. After all, the dragons wouldn't have been flaming if they hadn't been retaliating to his strikes, and they wouldn't have been near Merida's territory if he hadn't lead them on a merry chase.

 

"Good." Clapping her hands once briskly, Rapuzel turned to their spectator. "Thank you for bringing the boys to us, Aster. Please pass on to Tooth and Sandy that they're welcome to join us for dinner tonight at my place. North as well if he's free, I know he's awfully busy lately. I figure we'll all be hungry with the work we'll be doing."

 

"Aye, I'll let 'em know." Bunny gave a salute and grin, then darted away into the surrounding greenery.

 

"Well, let's get to work." Merida said. Pointing at the dragons, she ordered, "Meet me at the castle ruins to the north-west of here. You can't miss them, they're on a hilltop and everything." Getting two nods, she turned and galloped off.

 

"You can follow me up. The trees are a bit thick in these parts." Jack said, Rapuzel settled on his back, her hair quickly braided with magic and wrapped around her to keep it out of the way of white wings. With that, he leaped upward and into the canopy, Toothless and Hiccup on his tail.

 

The day was full of hard work but was overall a good one. At the end of it, relaxing in the cavernous dining hall of Rapuzel's home with several interesting people all eating and laughing with him rather than at him, Hiccup decided that he was glad a certain ice griffin had decided to use him as target practice.

 

After all, the young dragon got several new friends out of it, which were very welcome.

 

He'd just have to find a way to prank the griffin in payment for that first shot. That ice was cold, blast it!

 

* * *

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> may or may not continue this. I can think of other bits of backstory and future scenes without too much trouble. that's one of the things I love about writing, you can create so much from just a little information with a bit of imagination.
> 
> If I do add more to this 'verse, it'll be in a separate work.
> 
> random author babble below, not necessary to read.
> 
> This was a bit of a pain to come up with at first. I mean, the four worlds of RotBTD are pretty much fantasy based in some form or another (dragons, magic, spirits, etc). I went through a few ideas, like they were all mages of some sort or fae, but others prompts use those. Then I thought, hey, what if Hiccup was a dragon? With that, Jack needed to be something other than human too, if I just kept him as a spirit or something similar, it would be too close to his original / movie / canon form. Rapunzel was supposed to be a mermaid originally, but I felt that wasn't fair keeping her locked up in water like that, so she became a water nymph, allowing her to travel on land without too much trouble. Merida wrote herself in (my fingers just typed centaur, and I said, eh, why not) and Bunnymund just snuck in with his rabbit-faun form. All in all, this was fun, and like I mentioned earlier, I can definitely see a few more scenes in this 'verse, especially if anyone is interested in reading more about them.


End file.
